Because I’m a huge dork and have my own server here at home, I have a DNS set up on it so that I can access it via it’s hostname. When I set up the computers in our apartment, I used an IP range I was familiar with – my work’s.

Bad idea. At first this wasn’t a big deal and everything worked fine. But I was having issues with the domain controller/file server dropping users in the middle of their session so I made a few changes to the network properties of the computer and everything worked fine…..sort of.

Because I was using work’s IP range, when I made the change, I could no longer get to any of my work sites. I couldn’t figure out what was going on until I started thinking back to changes I’d made. Now it seems obvious but because I jumped in without really knowing how DNS works, it caused me trouble.

I guess now I’m just a little bit wiser which is always a good thing.

Even though our original plan to go to West Virginia didn’t happen we ended up having a fantastic trip and gained a little respect for Pennsylvania backpacking. We haven’t found the El Dorado of East Coast backpacking yet, but we got a little bit closer this weekend.

We went to the Sproul State Forest a bit north of State College, PA. It was about a 4 hour drive from Philly including stops for gas. We hiked the East Loop of the Chuck Keiper Trail which we read about in the book Backpacking Pennsylvania.

The guidebook wasn’t very good and we got lost trying the find the trailhead. The maps of the area were also terrible so it made figuring out where we were difficult. The trail itself was well blazed but parts of the actual trail were still hard to find. I think the lack of a quality trail is because the area doesn’t get much use. We spent 2 full days (and one evening) in the backcountry and only saw 2 other people. The isolation was my favorite part of the trip.

We got started late, late on Saturday night so only hiked in about a mile before setting up camp. By the time we were finished cooking it was about 10:00 so we went to bed and woke up the next morning for a full day of hiking. Let me say that there are two horrible, horrible things about backpacking in Pennsylvania – bugs and humidity (in that order).

We hiked a total of 14 miles the second day, from about 11:00 to 6:00 and the bugs were terrible the entire way. The scenery was great but the bugs made it difficult to actually stop and enjoy any of it. We had biting flies, mosquitoes, gnats, and all kinds of bugs all flying around our heads and into our eyes. The humidity on both days was also brutal. I’ve never had to drink so much water on a backpacking trip and I’ve also never felt as disgusting as I have on this trip. The guidebook says that summer is many people’s least favorite month to backpack and I have to agree. It’s terrible.

While the second day was really tough, it was rewarding. We covered a lot of miles and saw a lot of the backcountry. We picked a good place to camp but were too tired to make dinner so we just set up the tent and passed out. At night we were awoken by bright lights outside the tent. At first we thought they were flashlights but realized that they were fireflies. I’ve only seen fireflies a couple of times but these were really spectacular. It was like a personal fireworks display a day early.

The third day was relaxing compared to the second. We covered about 7 miles and took a lot of water breaks. We started hiking about 10:30 and got to the car about 5:00 but the leisurely pace made the scenery more enjoyable. I think both the bugs and humidity were worse on the last day, but once we got up higher the bugs became a non-issue.

Overall this was a good trip. The first backpacking trip out is always cool and this one didn’t disappoint. I’m still bummed that we didn’t get to go to West Virginia but I think we’ll aim to do that over Memorial Day when the bugs won’t be so bad. Doing this trail also made me realize how out of shape I am and gives me some incentive to exercise more. I think my pack was about 40 lbs, but by the end it felt like it was 60.

Trail: East Loop of the Chuck Keiper Trail
Location: Sproul State Forest
Distance: 22 miles
Our Time: 2+ days (2 mile per hour average)

Unfortunately we got a late start today and the specter of dealing with Philadelphia rush hour traffic was too much for us. West Virginia is still on the list, but we scrapped it for this weekend in favor of a trip a little bit closer to home.

We’re going to check out the Chuck Keiper Trail in Central, PA. I’m brining along my PocketPC with the hope of doing small trail write ups as we go along. I’ve also downloaded a book by John Muir The Grand Cañon of the Colorado, from Project Gutenberg that I’m planning on trying to read this weekend. Hopefully the battery in the PocketPC will last long enough to make it all work.

I’ll post a trip report and some pictures when we get back.

The CrackBerry backlash
Jun 23rd 2005
From The Economist print edition

You can have too much BlackBerry

THE BlackBerry, an iconic pocket-sized e-mail device, has millions of devoted fans?but increasingly has its critics, too. ?My wife has banned me from using it at weekends,? moans one technology industry executive. At a recent technology conference organised by The Economist, the question of ?CrackBerry? dependency, rather than grid computing or web services, was one of the hottest topics. The winner of the British version of ?The Apprentice?, a reality TV show, has admitted that his wife has threatened to flush his BlackBerry down the toilet. Meanwhile bosses grumble that nobody pays attention in meetings any more, because they are so busy doing e-mail under the table. It takes over your life! It ruins your marriage! It distracts you at work! The BlackBerry backlash, it seems, has begun.

The rise of the BlackBerry is part of a wider trend, as wireless and broadband technologies make it possible to work any time, anywhere. But blaming communications technologies for their social consequences is shooting the messenger. This has been going on since the mid-19th century, when telegrams were introduced. ?The businessman of the present day must be continually on the jump?he must use the telegraph,? grumbled one New York merchant in 1868. With each new gizmo, most people eventually discover a sensible work/life balance. It just takes time to adjust.

True, wireless devices pose a particular challenge, because they work anywhere. As a result, users themselves must decide when to use them for work and when not to?and many people, it seems, are so far unable to decide where to draw the line. ?It’s wonderful that we can work anywhere now, but at the same time we need rules for ourselves,? says Andrew Brown, a mobile-computing specialist at IDC, a consultancy. In some cases, he says, workers have refused to use mobile e-mail devices, or have given them back. Less drastically, P. Diddy, a rap star, is reported to have switched off his BlackBerry for a few weeks while he appears in a Broadway play. Is he the first celebrity member of the growing, happy band of recovering CrackBerry addicts?

I just downloaded Rob Rohan’s (of CFEclipse Fame) new Eclipse plug-in Afae (an all-purpose editor for Eclipse).

My one complaint with Eclipse is that there isn’t a clean, easy way to edit any kind of file. It’s made for Java editing, so having a multi-tool editor just wasn’t a priority. So far, Afae fits the bill really well. The interface is clean, code-coloring is good, and it supports a lot of files.

It’s definitely worth a download but I think he should change the name to “The Swiss Army Knife Editor”